“He isn’t laughing because he’s killing someone,” Rogan said gently. “He’s laughing because he’s finally using his magic. This is what he was born to do. In the moment the bullet hits the target, he doesn’t feel small, or weak, or useless, because it works. He would laugh the same way if he was shooting at sandbags. Think about how it felt when you used an amplification circle for the first time.”
When I sent my magic into the circle and that first rush of power came back, surging through me, twice as potent as before, it felt like I had learned to fly. Leon had wanted magic so badly. He didn’t even realize he had it.
“I hope you’re right.”
“Ask him.”
“I will.”
Rogan closed his laptop. “Please take Leon with you.”
“You want me to bring my baby cousin with me in case I get into a firefight?”
“Please consider it,” Rogan suggested.
“I’ll think about it.”
Rogan studied me. His power uncurled around him and wound around me, as if it too didn’t want to let me go.
“Be careful out there,” the dragon said.
“I’ll bring my sword and shield,” I murmured, brushed a kiss on his lips, and headed to the stairway.
Rynda stood on the stairs, just out of sight. She hurried up, pretending that I caught her walking up the stairs, but I would’ve heard her moving. No, she’d waited on the steps until I was leaving.
“How are you this morning?” I asked.
“I still don’t have my husband,” she said quietly.
“I’m working on it.”
“I know.”
There didn’t seem to be much left to say after that, so I took the stairs down.
On the bottom floor, to the left of the open doors, someone had rigged a big-screen TV. Sergeant Teddy sprawled in front of it. Matilda sat in the crook of his paw, a big bowl of trail mix on her lap. Jessica and Kyle leaned against Sergeant Teddy’s side. I rubbed my eyes to make sure I wasn’t seeing things.
On the screen, Bear in the Big Blue House sang a song about cleaning. Matilda picked some dried apples out of the bowl. Sergeant Teddy opened his mouth, and she put the fruit on his tongue. The enormous grizzly chewed. The children watched the show, content.
I snapped a picture with my phone and went home.
Fullerton waited in my office, as lanky and grim as I remembered. I stopping humming “Come on everybody, let’s clean up the house,” nodded at him through the glass, retrieved the cooler, and brought it to my office.
“I’ve received a request from House Sherwood,” Fullerton said. “Specifically, from Rynda Sherwood. She asked me to give you my full cooperation and assistance.”
I opened the cooler and let him look inside. “Could you sequence the DNA and determine if this ear belongs to Brian Sherwood?”
“Yes.” Fullerton looked at me, his long face thoughtful. “Is time of the essence?”
“Yes.”
“Do you require confirmation or proof that would stand in a court of law?”
“Confirmation will be sufficient.”
Fullerton pulled back his suit sleeve and held his hand above the ear, fingers splayed. Magic pulsed from him in a short, controlled burst. He raised his hand and tugged the sleeve back. “The ear doesn’t belong to Brian Sherwood or any other member of House Sherwood.”
I knew it. “Are you certain?”
“I’m never wrong,” he said.
“Thank you for your services. Please bill me.”
“I will,” he said.
“Have there been any inquiries on our account?”
“No. I would’ve immediately notified you. Is there a particular inquiry you’re waiting for, Ms. Baylor?”
“Yes. House Rogan.”
Fullerton paused, his face thoughtful. “You can receive requests for the genetic profile. You can also make them. They wouldn’t be honored until after your trials and the formal establishment of your House, but they can be made now. Good evening, Ms. Baylor.”
I saw him to the door, packed the cooler back into the fridge, and walked to Cornelius’ office. He wasn’t in it.
I could request Rogan’s profile.
What if he said no?
More importantly, did I really care if his genes aligned with mine or did I just want him the way he was, without any qualifiers?
Yes. I just wanted him.
I returned to my office and checked my laptop. Bern wasn’t up on the family network. I pushed the intercom. “Does anybody know where Bern is?”
“He left with Cornelius to check something out,” Leon responded.
“Where is everybody?”
“Your mom is with Grandma helping her in the motor pool. The control freak and evil incarnate are in the control freak’s room.”
Control freak and evil, huh. Someone was sore about something.
“What are they doing in there?”
“They won’t tell me. Something happened on Instagram. I looked at their accounts, but I can’t see anything.”
Ah. Leon had the curiosity of a cat. When you locked him out, it drove him nuts.
Everyone was busy. It was just me and Leon. The stars had aligned. I sighed.
“Come to the office.”
“Why?”
“I’ll tell you when you get here.”
I unlocked the small gun safe I kept hidden in the bottom drawer of my desk and took out my Sig 210 and a magazine.
Leon sauntered into my office and flopped into my client chair, a picture of teenage apathy.
I showed him the magazine. “Eight rounds, 9mm.”
Leon’s eyes lit up. He leaned forward, his eyes fixed on the gun.
“Manual safety. The barrel is machined from a solid block of steel. It’s an older gun, but it’s durable, reliable, and it’s very accurate. That’s what I practiced with and that’s what my dad shot.”
I pushed the gun and the magazine toward him. He swiped it off the table, slid the magazine into the gun, and sighted the hallway with it, all in one blink. One moment the gun was on the table, the next it jumped into his hand.
“Get a holster,” I told him. “And a zip-up hoodie. I shouldn’t see the gun under your clothes. I’m going out and you’re my backup.”
He leaped out of the seat and took off. I sighed. This was probably the wrong thing to do. Leon would turn seventeen in twelve days, right behind Catalina, who would be eighteen in three. I still needed to buy them both a gift. The way this was going, Catalina would end up doing trials right on her birthday. All the holidays were screwed up this year. First Christmas, now her birthday, and probably Leon’s birthday. Ugh.
In a year, Leon could legally enlist in the military, where he would be given a firearm and conditioned to use it. In a year and a half, he could be out in the field, killing people left and right. Nothing magical happened to separate your eighteenth birthday from your seventeenth. You became an adult, but you didn’t feel like one.
It’s time he knew. We couldn’t shelter him forever.
I pulled out my phone and texted Bern. Where are you?
Checking on a lead with Cornelius. Where are you?
Asking about what lead would spark a chain reaction of explanations, and knowing Bern, he’d start with him getting up this morning and then spend the next twenty minutes presenting it in a logical fashion.
Going to see Edward in the hospital. Leon’s with me. Be careful.
We will.
I texted Arabella. What’s going on with you two?
Alessandro Sagredo followed Catalina on Instagram. She’s freaking out.
Who the heck is Alessandro Sagredo and why did his name sound familiar?
I pulled my laptop closer and typed in the name. Alessandro Sagredo, second son of House Sagredo, Antistasi Prime . . . Oh. He was the Italian Prime the Office of Records was bringing in to test Catalina’s magic.
So he followed her on Instagram. What’s the big deal? He’s go
ing to test her in the trials. Tell her it’s nothing weird.
She’s FREAKING out. I’m trying to calm her down. I may have to get wine. Or pot. Can I buy some pot?
No.
It’s medicinal.
No pot or I tell Mom.
Leon reappeared, wearing a loose blue hoodie. He was lean bordering on skinny, and the sweatshirt hung on his sparse frame. He could’ve hidden a bazooka under there and I wouldn’t be able to tell.
I fixed him with my serious stare. “You’re going as my backup. I don’t expect trouble, but if it happens, you shoot only when I give you the order. If you fire before I give you permission, I’ll never take you with me again, and I’ll make sure you don’t get anywhere close to a gun for the next year and a half. Do we understand each other?”
Leon frantically nodded.
“Good.”
The head of Edward Sherwood’s guard detail stared at me. He was a stocky, muscular man who looked like he could run through a wall, and he was doing his best to be intimidating. I had a feeling I was supposed to wilt under that stare.
“We won’t be surrendering our firearms,” I told him.
“Then you won’t see Mr. Sherwood.”
“Please ask him if he will see us anyway. This matter concerns his brother.”
“You’re not getting into that hospital room armed,” he said.
“The last time I saw Mr. Sherwood, I was armed, and I put myself between him and the creature that was trying to eat him.”
“We’re aware of your role, Ms. Baylor. House Sherwood is grateful for your assistance.”
It was time to pull out the big guns. “Before I arrived to the incident that resulted in this situation, my associate called to House Sherwood and informed your head of security that we believed Rynda Sherwood was in danger. We were told to mind our own business.”
The guard’s ice-cold composure cracked a little. “That person is no longer employed by House Sherwood.”
“I’m so glad to hear that. It’s very disheartening when you try to offer important information only to be brushed off. Please ask Edward if he would see us anyway. It’s important and urgent.”
The man stared at me. A switch clicked in his head. That’s right, the last time your people blew me off, your Prime was hurt and your chief of security was fired.
“Please wait here.” He turned around and walked down the hallway, leaving us in the waiting room under the watchful eyes of a man and a woman in House Sherwood uniforms.
Leon winked at them. They remained stoic.
My phone chimed. Cornelius. I answered the call. “Yes?”
“We’ve gone through Brian’s receipts,” Cornelius said. “On December 21st, he stopped at Millennium Coffee House. Brian doesn’t drink coffee or tea. Millennium Coffee House is located near the intersection of Gulf and the 610. He drove fifteen miles. There are sixteen coffee shops that are closer to BioCore.”
It made no sense for him to drive fifteen miles in Houston traffic for a coffee he doesn’t drink.
“Was he alone?”
“No. The barista remembered him because he ordered a fruit tea and then made a fuss because she wrote Bryan with a Y instead of Brian with an I on his cup. He met a man there. They sat outside and spoke for about forty-five minutes. She could see through the window. We showed her some pictures, and she picked Sturm out.”
And the pieces had fallen into place. “Thank you.”
“Does that help?”
“It’s exactly what we needed.”
“Fantastic. Here is Bernard.”
“Nevada?” my cousin said into the phone.
“Yes?”
“Bug and I tracked Brian’s logins. Someone used his credentials to log into his home network on December 21st. According to their emails and Rynda’s Facebook, they spent the evening with her mother-in-law and Edward.”
“Is there any way to trace what was accessed? Did they copy anything?”
“No. To a computer system, opening a file and copying it is pretty much the same thing. It doesn’t record the difference. All I can tell you is someone who wasn’t Brian Sherwood had complete access to his network.”
“Thank you.”
“We’re going home.”
“Be careful.”
“We will.”
I hung up.
The head of security emerged from the hallway. “He’ll see you now.”
Edward lay in a hospital bed, his skin only a couple of shades darker than the stark white of the sheets. Sunlight streamed through the open drapes, falling on a beautiful bonsai tree on the table next to him. A compact woman, her hair pulled back into a severe ponytail, waited discreetly in the corner, watching me and Leon like a hawk. She carried a Beretta. Leon parked himself next to her, looking like he didn’t have a care in the world. She gave him a once-over and dismissed him.
The head of security stood guard by the door and showed no signs of moving.
I pulled up a chair. “How are you feeling?”
“Like a man who dodged a bullet,” he said quietly. He touched the controls on the armrest of the bed, and it slowly moved to bring him into a semi-sitting position. “Have you found Brian?”
“No.”
“How’s Rynda?”
“She’s holding up.”
“She came to see me last night.” He reached out and touched the leaves of the bonsai.
“Did she bring the tree?”
“Yes. Satsuki Azalea, seventy-two years old. Flowers from May to June. The blossoms are beautiful pink and white. They have a really diverse range of flowering patterns, even on the same tree. I’ve wanted one for a while, but I’ve been so busy lately. She remembered.” He smiled, then caught himself. “Thank you for saving her and the children. And me. Us.”
“You don’t have to thank me. Anyone in my place would’ve done the same.”
“I doubt it.”
There was no easy way to say it. “How much do you trust your security people?”
I had to give it to him; even on his sickbed Edward managed a glare. “I trust them.”
“What I’m about to say can’t go past this room.”
“Say whatever it is.”
I kept my voice low. “Alexander Sturm is involved in the kidnapping of your brother.”
A heavy silence descended. Every time Sturm’s name was mentioned, people paused.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. We can’t prove it yet, but we’re certain.”
“But why?”
“Alexander Sturm and Vincent Harcourt are part of a conspiracy that involved Olivia Charles. They belong to an organization of Primes that’s trying to destabilize Houston so they can put their leader in power. They call him Caesar. Adam Pierce was also part of this conspiracy.”
Edward gaped at me.
“Sturm is under the impression that Olivia hid something in Brian and Rynda’s house. Something vital. He wants it back, but he refuses to state clearly what he’s looking for. He wasn’t happy with our failure to find the ransom, so he sent a severed human ear to Rynda to try to convince us to expedite our efforts.”
“Dear God.” Edward tried to rise.
“Please don’t get up,” the head of security said. “Please, sir. We need you to get well.”
Edward lowered himself back onto the bed.
“On December 21st, your brother visited Millennium Coffee House about fifteen miles from BioCore. He met Sturm there.”
I let it sink in.
Edward frowned. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. We found an eyewitness who picked Sturm out of a photo lineup.”
“Brian had no reason to meet Sturm. BioCore doesn’t do business with Sturm Enterprises. And if he wanted to meet him, why go alone? Everyone knows Sturm’s reputation. Why didn’t he tell me about it?”
Those were excellent questions. “Later that night, when Brian and Rynda met you and your mother for dinner, someone used Brian’s credentials to log
into his home network.”
He didn’t say anything.
“Brian’s kidnapping occurred in seconds. The people who perpetrated it were efficient and professional. Brian is predictable. He drives the same route to work and back at about the same time every day, along Memorial Drive, which is mostly wooded. There are three cameras along the route Brian takes to work, but only one offers an unobstructed view of the road.”
Edward still didn’t say anything. I couldn’t tell if he had connected the dots or not.
“They managed to force him to stop at the exact spot along his route where his kidnapping was guaranteed to be recorded. Thirty feet in either direction, and the crime would never have been caught on camera. It’s highly unlikely that a crew that efficient hadn’t done their homework and didn’t know where the cameras were located. It’s also interesting that once they tapped his bumper, Brian drove into the guardrail, conveniently marking the location of his kidnapping.”
Edward’s eyes turned dark. It was time to deliver the final blow.
“When Rynda asked Brian if he was okay, after the ear was delivered, he stated that he was in pain. When she asked him if his wound was treated by a doctor, he said it was. We contracted Scroll to perform a DNA analysis on the severed ear. It doesn’t belong to your brother.”
Edward looked up. His face tightened. His jaw set. He stared at the ceiling as if he were going to burn a hole in it with his gaze. His hands curled into fists, crushing the sheets. Edward Sherwood was monumentally angry, and he was doing all he could to contain his rage.
I waited.
He unclenched his jaw. His voice was a low growl. “I’ll fucking kill him.”
The bonsai creaked. Its trunk thickened, its branches thrust up, growing. Roots writhed under the soil.
“I’ll strangle him with my bare hands.”
Buds formed on the branches.
“I always knew he was a coward. But this is . . .” He shook with fury.
The ceramic planter cracked and burst. Pieces of it showered my clothes. Behind me Leon must’ve moved, because the security chief drew his gun.
The azalea spread its roots, grasping the table like some monstrous octopus. It had quadrupled in size, its branches hanging over the bed.
“This is beyond anything he’s ever done before. That scumbag. That cowardly, weak scumbag.”